Wooden Roof Shingles

 

Overview:

Wooden roof shingles are fairly easy to make and install if you have the right equipment.   A bandsaw is useful to create the raw shingles although the correct thickness stock can be purchased and then cut into appropriate sizes using a small tablesaw.  A larger tablesaw is also useful for creating the source material for different sized shingles.

 

Shingle Stock material

  1. These are various widths of stock material (redwood) which were sawn from a redwood 2 X 4.  The widths vary from 1/4 to 3/4 in.  The thicknesses and lengths are unimportant but will determine how many shingles can be made from each piece of wood.  The shingles need to be of different widths.

Bandsawing a Strip of Shingles

  1. This is my bandsaw setup for cutting a strip of shingles.  The thickness is set for 1/16 in.  The bandsaw leaves a nice rough surface which more realistically resembles full size shingles.  The wooden stock blocks could be periodically flattened with a jointer or belt sander if the bandsaw makes the block significantly uneven.

 

Tablesaw - Individual Shingles

  1. The strip of shingles is cut into 1 3/4 in lengths for the individual shingles.  I used a tablesaw with a stop block for cutting multiple shingles of the same length with a minimum of effort.  These could all be cut with a miterbox and a handsaw.

 

Spare Shingles

  1. You can never have too many shingles and spares will save reprising the machine setups.  I stained them all together on the roof but they could also be stained prior to placement on the roof.  I used a strong tea to give the basic color to the redwood but various stains such as Minwax would work fine also.

 

BayWindow Shingles

  1. The shingles were stapled to the roof with one staple attaching two adjacent shingles.  Each shingle except for the end ones are held to the roof by two staples.  Hot glue would also work well.  The attachment is covered by the next higher row of shingles.  The amount of shingle exposed is 3/4 in.  To keep the shingles on track, a yardstick / ruler was used to place parallel lines on the roof to align the shingles.  The lines should be 3/4 in apart to allow for the exposed portion. 

 

Main Roof

  1. The first course of shingles at the bottom of the roof is a double layer.  The next layer of shingles covers the gaps between the lower row.  The final touch is a blotching staining of some of the shingles slightly darker than their neighbors to add a more random look.  Too evenly colored shingles look artificial. 

 

Shingles - Closeup

  1. As a picture is worth a thousand words, this photo should best describe how the shingles are applied. 

 

 

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